


First Time

by Severina



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Community: tamingthemuse, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-23
Updated: 2012-06-23
Packaged: 2017-11-08 09:37:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/441795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When it's his turn, he tries not to look at her face.</p>
            </blockquote>





	First Time

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LJ's tamingthemuse community, for the prompt 'under the table'.  
> Pre-series.  
> Merle is a racist. His views are not mine.
> 
> * * *

It ain't the kind of place they usually go to, but Merle wants a good steak dinner before he's relegated to whatever slop they serve up to grunts in basic training. 

Daryl picks at his food, stomach too tied in knots to give a shit about his own steak, no matter how much Merle rails on about how it cost nearly twenty five fucking dollars and he's "gotta eat, son, put some meat on those bones". 

He slinks down, only half-listens while Merle talks about the pussies at the recruitment office and how he's gonna be runnin' his platoon by the time the new year comes around. His attention wanders, past the parents playing happy families, past the waitress in her pressed shirt givin' them the stink eye. Comes to light on a couple of girls his age, clustered around one of the square tables in the middle of the restaurant. Comes to rest on one girl in particular, long shiny black hair and bright yellow tank top with little white buttons.

He recognizes her, too, even though they don't share any classes. He sees her in the hall sometimes. She wears short flared skirts that show off her legs, and she talks with her hands, all animated and shit, and she's always smilin'. She's a junior to his sophomore, but that don't stop her from sometimes even flashing him a smile when they pass, even though the only thing he can ever give her in return feels weak and sickly on his face. Name's somethin' real pretty, Angelita or Marguerita.

"You listenin' to me, boy?"

Daryl starts, pulls his gaze back to where it belongs. "Huh?"

" _Huh_ ," Merle mocks. "What you lookin' at's more important than the _life lessons_ I'm tryin' to teach ya 'fore I'm gone, _huh_?"

"Nah, Merle, it's nothin'," Daryl starts, but Merle is already looking over his shoulder, sharp gaze scanning the room. 

"What?" Merle asks, turning back to him, raising one brow. "That wetback? Hell, all they's good for is a blowjob. Them wetbacks suck like a vacuum cleaner, and that ain't no lie." Merle laughs loudly. "Don't you worry, little brother. I'm gonna get you laid by a _real_ woman."

Daryl flinches when Merle's hand comes down hard on his shoulder, drops his eyes to the table and slouches further into the booth. The girl's friends are oblivious, deep in conversation, but there ain't no way the girl herself didn't hear. Her hands, the ones that normally move so quick and bright, are shredding the paper napkin in her lap.

He's relieved a few minutes later when she taps her friends on the elbow and they get up to leave. The door don't make any more noise than it usually does when it shuts behind them, but it sounds like a thunderclap all the same.

* * *

Merle goes first.

The walls in the little house are paper thin.

Daryl sits on the worn-out sofa, wills his leg to stop shakin' and lips off to Merle's dickwad friends whenever they get too personal.

When it's his turn, he tries not to look at her face. She smells like sweat and sex and the stale funky scent of the bottom of an empty cola can, and though she probably ain't more than twenty-five she's already been used up and spit out. He doesn't think he's going to be able to get it up and then he doesn't think he's going to be able to keep it up, so he closes his eyes and pretends he's somewhere else, not some broken down bungalow in the worst part of town, able to hear his brother regaling the others about his five-minute-old sexual exploits in the next room. Pretends he's with anyone else, not some beat-down whore with glassy eyes and lines on her face that don't belong there. Hell, pretends _he's_ someone else, not Daryl Dixon at all, not stuck in this shit 'burg with this shit life. 

When he comes he's just glad to get it over with. And the whore's already cookin' up her payment before he's got his pants back on.

He emerges from the bedroom into a haze of smoke, sloughs off the back slaps and heads to the kitchen.

Daryl drags a beer out of the battered fridge, downs it in one long pull before grabbing another and snagging the bottle of tequila from the counter. He slumps at the table, listens to Merle's buddies bragging about the shit they've pulled and the scams they've run and the women they've fucked, and tries to find oblivion in the bottle. 

When he tries to get up to take a piss and his legs give out, Merle laughs louder than any of them. 

Daryl doesn't care. He climbs under the table, presses his cheek to the cool metal leg. Pretends he's not trapped.


End file.
